


Happy Families

by lifevolutionary



Series: Kith and Kin [6]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Future Fic, Kid Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-09
Updated: 2010-07-09
Packaged: 2017-10-10 11:29:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/99252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lifevolutionary/pseuds/lifevolutionary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the second time in his life Gabriel looked into eyes exactly the same weird shade of amber/butterscotch as his own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Happy Families

For the second time in his life Gabriel looked into eyes exactly the same weird shade of amber/butterscotch as his own.

For this moment everything was worth it. The fights, the suspicion, Dean being...well, Dean, the waiting, the keeping secrets because telling the truth would probably have had paradox-inducing consequences, everything. It was all worth it to look at this little bundle of kid in his arms and know that he was Gabriel's fledgling, that he would grow up to be the boy who would save Gabriel's life.

This child was the living embodiment of everything Gabriel had never let himself have before; a family. A lover who he would be quite happy to stay with for the rest of eternity, a fledgling who he would move the Earth and the Heavens for, an awesome, if slightly daft little brother, a beautiful niece, Dean, who unfortunately came with Sam and Cas but whom Gabriel actually liked quite a lot these days, though he'd never, ever admit that out loud.

Suddenly it was all real and it was so, so very worth it.

Gabriel stroked a finger down Robert's cheek the same way he'd done with Joanna just after she'd been born. He'd stepped away from the others, partly to switch his gender back but mostly so he could welcome his fledgling the same way he'd welcomed Cas'.

"You're finally here. Hello Robert."

"So I don't get any say in naming my own son, then? You're not even going to ask?" Gabriel's head shot up and he could feel the blood draining out of his face as he stared at Sam standing in the doorway. He looked pissed.

Oh, _Daddammit._

Sam stared at him while Gabriel tried to think of something to say and as the silence stretched the pissy-ness was replaced by amusement. "You didn't know I was here, did you? Don't you have some sort of Archangel radar that tells you where everyone is?"

"I'm not a submarine, Sam." Gabriel bantered back on automatic then remembered that he was in trouble. "Um. I was. Going to ask you, I mean."

Sam shook his head and stepped up right into Gabriel's personal space so he could reach down to Robert and run a finger over the kid's tufty dark brown hair. "Robert?" He raised his gaze to Gabriel's face with a quirked smile. "Like I was going to say no to naming him after Bobby." Sam knew that Gabriel still felt guilty about Bobby's death, in a weird tenuous responsibility sort of way. After all, if Gabriel hadn't fixed his legs then Bobby never would have been hunting the dragon that eventually killed him (seriously, dragon, could he have gone out any more dramatically?).

"I'd been kind of counting on that. Was still going to ask you though."

"Nevermind. It'll get me off the hook with Dean anyway. He was so determined that if Cas had a boy he would have been called John I was afraid he'd expect me to be the same."

"Yeah, no. That's going to happen. Middle name Jonathan, maybe, but no son of mine will be named after your father." Gabriel pulled a face.

Sam wrapped an arm around Gabriel's waist and buried his face in Gabriel's hair as he laughed. It was a joyful, carefree sound that he knew Sam never would have made before Joanna was born and it was one Gabriel tried to startle out of Sam on a regular basis. When Robert's tiny hand gripped hold of Sam's stroking finger Sam lifted his head and smiled down at their child.

"Robert Jonathan." The joyful smile became an amused grin when he turned it on Gabriel. "No-one's ever going to believe that you named him and not me."

~*~ * ~*~ *

Joanna looked down at the baby in her arms and then up at the four adults watching her. Gabriel grinned as she made a face that for a three year old was deep thought.

"Robert?" She looked questioningly at Cas who was crouched next to her.

"That's right. He is your uncles' fledgling." Cas explained to her, calmly.

"Is he my brother?"

Gabriel dropped down to sit cross-legged in front of her, smiling at the two kids, revelling in seeing them together. "No, because you have different parents. But he is your cousin because me and Sam are your uncles."

"Okay." She pouted. "But I want him to be my brother. You're Papa's brother and Uncle Sam is Daddy's brother, I want a brother too!" Gabriel had to suppress a laugh at the panic he saw cross Dean's face.

"Well, you can still look out for him as if he was your brother." Gabriel told. "Just like your Dad used to do for Sam when they were little." He appealed to her determination to be just like Dean. She squinted at him, giving the look that said she thought he was being silly. Sometimes Gabriel wondered if her Angel heritage was making her grow up quicker than she should.

"That's not right. Uncle Sammy isn't littler than Daddy." From above there was a choking sound that Gabriel identified as Sam trying not to laugh. He met Cas' eyes shared an amused glance with his brother.

"Not anymore, no. But he is younger so he would have been littler when they were kids." Joanna looked up at Dean and Sam with wide eyes.

"You were little like me? Really?" Gabriel grinned at her disbelief, looking up along with her at the two Winchesters towering over them. Dean crouched down next to Cas and ran a hand softly over Joanna's hair.

"Really. I was only a little older than you when Sam was born." Dean explained.

Gabriel stood and leant back into Sam's embrace as Dean told Joanna about John charging him with looking after Sam. When the kids were older they'd have to explain to them just why Dean had had to look out for Sam so much but that was for later. Now Gabriel watched Joanna cradle Robert close, as if she could protect him from everything if only she held him tight enough.

"Remind me to get a digital camera at some point." Sam murmured in his ear. "I should have thought of it before. Me and Dean don't have any pictures from when we were growing up, we should make Joanna and Robert have some."

Joanna yawned. "Nap time?" She asked sleepily.

"Yeah, baby." Dean smiled at her and reached over to lift Robert out of her arms. "Nap time now." As he stood Cas lifted Joanna and stood too. She peered over her father's shoulder at Robert.

"Robert nap time too? He sleep with me?" Her sentence structure wasn't so good when she was tired.

"He has a cot of his own, but we can put it in your room if you want." Dean looked at Gabriel and Sam as he said that, raising a questioning eyebrow. Gabriel nodded.

"Yes! Robert nap time with me!"

~*~ * ~*~ *

While the other three were putting the kids down for their nap, Gabriel had some fun with time travel. By the time he got back the others had crashed in the sitting room; Sam on his laptop and Dean and Cas watching TV. Well, Dean watching TV and Cas listening with long-suffering bemusement as Dean tried and failed to explain the plot to him in a way that made some sort of coherent sense.

Sam looked up as he came in, "Where have you been?"

"Earning good boyfriend points."

Sam gave him a bemused look as Gabriel flopped down next to him on their sofa. "What?"

Gabriel held out the photo album he was holding in Sam's direction. "Here." Sam took it but still looked bemused. "Open it."

When Sam saw what was on the first page he gaped. The caption above the first picture read: Sam and Dean, the Adorable Years. The picture showed a four year old Dean sitting cross-legged on the grass in the back garden of a specific house in Lawrence, Kansas, with a bottle in one hand and a two month old Sam cradled with the other.

Sam stared at him in amazement, "You..." He didn't finish. Instead, he looked back down at the album and turned to the next page, entranced.

Dean, who'd noticed Sam's speechlessness came over and sat on the arm of the couch. "What've you got there?"

"I said earlier that we should start taking photos of the kids because we don't have any of us as kids." Sam looked up at his brother with a disbelieving smile. "So Gabriel...well, just look." He passed the album across to Dean.

Dean froze when he saw the pictures and the expression on his face, as he reached out a shaking hand to touch an image of a young version of himself proudly showing Mary Winchester that baby Sam was sleeping, made Gabriel worry that this hadn't been such a well thought out gift after all. But then Dean let out a breath that was also slightly shaky and turned a real smile, one that lit up his eyes, on first Sam, then Gabriel.

"What did you do?" Dean asked. "Follow us around our entire childhood with a camera?"

Gabriel shrugged dismissively, as if it was no big deal. "Pretty much, yeah."

"How come we never saw you?" Dean seemed genuinely curious. Gabriel opened his mouth to give his trademark response but Dean beat him too it, answering his own question. "Wait, don't tell me, I know. 'Archangel', right?" He rolled his eyes.

Gabriel beamed at him. Well, what d'you know? It was possible to train Dean Winchester after all.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Happy Families [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1637144) by [Tbowen71](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tbowen71/pseuds/Tbowen71)




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